Sex Discrimination

This page contains summaries of some of the most important cases published in C.H.R.R. on this topic (arranged chronologically).

If you are interested in obtaining a copy of the full text of a decision listed below click here to order.

New Test for Reasonable Accommodation

The Supreme Court of Canada holds that the Government of British Columbia's aerobic standard used to test the fitness of forest firefighters discriminates on the basis of sex, and further that the Government failed to show that the discriminatory standard is justified as a bona fide occupational requirement ("BFOR").

This case arose as a grievance before a labour arbitrator. Tawney Meiorin was employed for three years as a member of the Initial Attack Forest Firefighting crew. Although she did her work well, she lost her job when the Government adopted a new series of fitness tests for forest firefighters. She passed three of the tests but failed a fourth one, a 2.5 km run designed to assess whether she met the Government's aerobic standards, by taking 49.4 seconds longer than required.

The arbitrator found that the aerobic standard constituted adverse effect discrimination based on sex because men as a group have a higher aerobic capacity than women, and...

The Supreme Court of Canada rules that a refusal of membership in a men's organization is not a discriminatory denial of services contrary to the Yukon Human Rights Act.

The complainant Madeleine Gould had been refused membership in the Yukon Order of Pioneers because of her sex. She filed a complaint under the Act, which was heard by a Board of Adjudication. The Yukon Status of Women Council intervened in support of Gould's position. The Board of Adjudication ruled in favour of Gould based upon an Agreed Statement of Facts. The Board heard no testimony.

It was not disputed before the Board of Adjudication that the Order's action in rejecting Gould's application amounted to discrimination on the basis of sex contrary to s. 6(f) of the Act. The Board found that in preserving and collecting the literature and incidents of Yukon's history, the Order was "offering or providing services...to the public" and concluded that the discrimination...

The Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, rules that Safeway's employee disability plan discriminated against pregnant employees and that this constitutes discrimination because of sex within the meaning of s. 6(1) of the 1974 Manitoba Human Rights Act.

This is an appeal from a decision of the Manitoba Court of Appeal which found that the Safeway disability plan did not discriminate against pregnant employees and that discrimination because of pregnancy is not discrimination because of sex.

The Safeway disability plan, which was challenged in the complaints of Susan Brooks, Patricia Allen and Patricia Dixon, provided twenty-six weeks of disability benefits to any worker who had worked for Safeway for three months and who had to be absent from work for health reasons. However, the plan denied benefits to pregnant employees during a seventeen-week period commencing ten weeks before the week of childbirth and extending to six weeks after it. During this...

The Supreme Court of Canada unanimously reverses a decision of the Federal Court of Appeal and reinstates an order of a Tribunal requiring Canadian National Railway to hire one woman in every four new hires into unskilled blue-collar jobs.

A Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruled that Canadian National Railway had discriminated against women in the St. Lawrence region who were seeking employment in nontraditional blue-collar jobs. Women held only 0.7 percent of blue-collar jobs in the region, and the Tribunal found that CN Rail's recruitment, hiring and promotion policies prevented and discouraged women from working in blue-collar jobs. As part of a comprehensive remedial order, the Tribunal ordered CN Rail to hire one woman in every four new hires into blue-collar positions until the representation of women reached 13 percent, which is the national percentage for women working in equivalent jobs.

CN Rail appealed this decision to the Federal Court of Appeal which...